


It's Easier to Be Lost Than Found

by startwithsparks



Category: Teen Wolf (TV)
Genre: Hurt/Comfort, M/M, Mildly Dubious Consent
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-05-21
Updated: 2013-05-21
Packaged: 2017-12-12 13:45:29
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Underage
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,762
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/812234
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/startwithsparks/pseuds/startwithsparks
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Isaac hasn't had a stable home for months, so when an offer comes from the last person he expected, he has to wonder if there aren't ulterior motives involved.</p>
            </blockquote>





	It's Easier to Be Lost Than Found

There weren't a lot of foster families who wanted to take in a seventeen-year-old who had been involved, even remotely, in two deaths already. But Isaac figured there weren't really a lot of foster families who wanted to take in a seventeen-year-old regardless, that was just the way things worked. The younger and cuter a kid was, the sooner they got placed with families, and as their ages increased, their likelihood of going to a family decreased. Group homes were filled with kids like him, just a couple years short of aging out of the system, most of whom alternately dreaded and longed for the day they turned eighteen.

He'd only been here a few months himself, but with the school year quickly winding to a close, Isaac wasn't really looking forward to spending the summer trying to toe the line and continue explaining why he disappeared for three days every month. It had already gotten him in a lot of trouble - though for a while he didn't even bother leaving Derek's side for long enough for them to _find_ him - and he could already tell it was going to get him into a lot more. They'd talked briefly about it, the rest of the pack, and while there were some ideas floating around, it was difficult to get out of the system once you found your way into it. None of them, certainly not Derek or Peter, were what anyone would consider fit foster-parents, and it was a lot to ask of either Stiles or Scott's parents, who were already trying to keep one kid in line on their own. Single-family homes weren't ideal places for foster kids anyway. Even if either the Sheriff or Melissa applied, he couldn't hold his breath that they would make it through all the hoops to get approved.

So he waited, and every day he hoped that it would be the day that someone told him he had a home to go to - a real home, not one where he lived with ten other kids in a house meant for half that many. Maybe it was better than living with his dad had been, but almost anything would have been. He wanted to be with his pack - that was where he felt he _belonged_ \- and he knew there was going to come a day when he couldn't get out of there and he couldn't control himself well enough to hold the wolf inside. With that promise of disaster always lingering behind him, he felt like a ticking time bomb.

That knock on his door couldn't have come soon enough, but it did finally come.

He had his lanky body drawn across his bed, propped up on one elbow with a book spread out in front of him, when the house parent appeared in the doorway. He was a decent enough guy, though he treated the house like a business more than anything, with black hair going gray in streaks. There was a stack of papers pinned between his arm and chest as he leaned in the open doorway.

"Lahey," he said, and Isaac cocked his head towards him, leaning out of his bed a little. "Pack your stuff and come downstairs, you've been placed."

Isaac's brows furrowed, but he wasn't about to question something like that, no matter what the explanation behind it. Something about looking a gift horse in the mouth came to mind, and the only thing he could think about at that instant was the fact that he was leaving. It was an awkward catch-22, it could be a hell of a lot worse where he was going, but it could also be a hell of a lot better. Trepidation and excitement washed over him in equal parts and he and his roommate exchanged a silent look and a shrug as he rolled off his bed and reached for the duffle bag shoved under it.

His "stuff" was composed of his school bag, a box of books from home, and a bag that he quickly stuffed full of clothes. Everything else was stashed in the McCall's basement, though Melissa occasionally brought him stuff and he'd had a few weekend furloughs that allowed him to exchange books and clothes when he needed to. It was a little depressing that his entire life could fit in two bags and a printer paper box, but it was more than some kids came here with. At least he didn't have anything dragging behind him reminding him of things better left unremembered.

There wasn't much need for emotion or ceremony when it came to leaving; while there was a high turnover rate among them there were also a lot of kids who came back even after being placed with families. Most of the kids had affected a sort of cynical resignation, and they just nodded and wished him good luck as he hurried his way downstairs towards the family room. He didn't know what he'd find when he came downstairs - some friendly-looking strangers with a house full of kids who needed someone older to look after them, he expected - but the last person he could ever imagine he'd see waiting there for him was Chris Argent.

He stopped dead at the foot of the stairs, staring at Chris with an uncertain gaze, like an animal caught in the sights of a predator, and swallowed down the sudden lump in his throat.

"You know Mister Argent," the man said, glancing between them. "He says you're in the same class as his daughter."

Isaac nodded, "Yeah," he said softly. "Yeah, I know Allison." She'd only tried to kill two of his friends and her grandfather had done his best to murder half the town, so he could definitely say that Isaac knew her. He nodded at Chris, "Mister Argent."

He smiled back, holding his hands out for the box, which Isaac reluctantly handed over. "I think it's alright if you call me Chris, now..." he said, bracing the box against his hip as he held the front door open and nodded towards his car. "Come on, Allison's ordering pizza."

It felt so normal that it was unnerving, but Isaac followed with a faint grimace - feeling a bit like he was being led away to his own doom - out of the house and to the car waiting on the street. He didn't look back at the house behind him, not even when the car door shut and Chris started his way around to the driver's side, he didn't even want to think about looking back at where he'd come from anymore. Isaac held his book-bag tightly in his lap, fingers digging into the strap as Chris slid into the front seat.

His hand stalled on the ignition and he glanced over at Isaac. "You can stop looking like I'm going to eat you," he said. "Just because my father had no respect for it doesn't mean that I don't still follow the code."

"Keep your enemies close, huh?" Isaac murmured, chancing another sideways glance at him, but Chris just smiled and shook his head.

*

Even though the arrangement turned out to be exactly as weird as he expected it to be, Isaac realized fairly quick that he should have given Chris more credit than he did at first. Things had been crazy before, for everyone, and they were all acting under influences that none of them had control over. Madness had drawn the Argents to Beacon Hills and madness had cemented their stay there. It became obvious in no time that Gerard was the motivating force behind all of them, the cruelty and absolute intolerance that swept through the family. With him gone, with the pack and the hunters on the same side for even a moment, some of that tension had eased and placed them both on an, albeit tenuous, neutral ground. They still had a common enemy and there was still a grudging partnership there, but it was enough for Isaac to hang on to.

Living with Allison wasn't even as difficult as he thought it would be. She had been with Scott long enough to know her way around the whole werewolf thing, and they quickly bonded over fucked-up parents, grief, and being the only seventeen-year-olds in their class. She was smart, she had great taste in music, and she had a remarkable talent for diffusing Chris when he started slipping back into his fundamentalist hunter mindset. It didn't happen often, those slips, but when they did all it took was a careful reminder that they had a responsibility to do right by their family now. Normal didn't really exist around here, not with the constant threats knocking at their door. There were _bad_ things in the world, they saw constant proof of that, but Chris would protect him from those things, and he knew now that Isaac wasn't one of them. For lack of a better word, he felt _safe_ now, and Isaac had slowly started to adjust to living here.

It wasn't like they were all constantly shoved under one roof either. Chris still had his regular job, which demanded a lot of his time during the week, and Allison was still involved in a lot of extra-curricular activities. Scott had convinced her to go out for the track team with him, and she eventually convinced Lydia to act as a buffer so Chris didn't think that their not-dating status had evolved into dating again. Erica and Stiles both followed shortly after, and Danny as well, but Isaac decided to pool all his efforts and attention into academics instead. He'd barely managed to pass a lot of his classes the previous term and if he ever hoped to get into a good school, and prove to Chris that he hadn't made a mistake by taking him in, he was going to have to work a lot harder. He knew that some of the others used it as a helpful distraction, to keep their minds off everything else going on in their lives, but Isaac had never been able to juggle that much and concentrate well on any of it.

What that meant for him was that, between after-school practices and track meets, there were a lot of nights where Isaac and Chris had the house to themselves. At first he'd secluded himself upstairs in his room with excuses of homework or reading, but a little at a time Chris somehow managed to coax him downstairs - into the kitchen at first, then the living room, and before long he had Isaac lingering in his study listening to him talk about the Old Way and the Code and everything that hunting meant to him when he first started. The Argents had been doing this for longer than anyone could remember, and from time to time there was a little hint in Chris' voice that might have suggested _and you're an Argent now too_. The longer he listened to the passion in Chris' voice, the more the thought, and others with it, started to grow on him.

The more comfortable he got, the more time they ended up spending together, whether Allison was there or not. He'd never had a good relationship with his own father, so having a relationship with an older male now was something that he craved in a way he'd never realized before. He supposed that was what got him into all this trouble with Derek in the first place, but if there was one thing this had taught him it was that if he wasn't the victor, he'd be the victim. He didn't regret what he'd done, especially not because he knew that something in his life _had_ to change or else he'd never get out of that horrible cycle. Without that decision, as reckless as it might have been, he wouldn't be here, he wouldn't have met someone who told him almost every day that he could make something out of his life. Chris was the first person who'd even suggested that there might be something more for him in the world than just Beacon Hills and that, more than anything else, was the first piece that started forging a bond between them.

Tonight had them alone again. Allison left shortly after dinner to work on a presentation with Lydia and it was far enough from the next full moon that he hadn't started to feel that nagging draw to be close to his pack. He was perfectly content to spend the evening with Chris, quietly helping him clean up after dinner. He was washing and Chris was drying, the two of them casually chatting about what Isaac was working on in school. It was really nice, nice enough, apparently, that Isaac got a little too involved in the conversation and stopped paying attention to what he was doing...

The glass just slipped out of his hand, still wet and sudsy. His reflexes should have been quick enough to catch it before it hit the floor, but the moment he heard the clang of glass against the kitchen sink, he froze. His breath caught hard in his chest and he sort of glazed over for a moment, just watching as the glass plummeted to the floor. He finally snapped out of it at the sound of glass shattering by his feet and Isaac let out a weak whimper, instantly dropping to his knees on the floor and murmuring frantic apologies as a hot blush burned his cheeks. He couldn't hear anything Chris said over the buzz of blood in his ears, nothing but his own panic, as he started gathering up the shards of broken glass in his hands.

Before, with his father, that would have been when the yelling started. He could hear the grind of metal against vinyl echoing hollow in the back of his mind, a memory that had his hands shaking as he tried gathering the little slivers of broken glass off the floor. His mouth felt dry, acid and anxiety creeping up the back of his throat.

The hand on his shoulder made him flinch and jerk away, glass sliding from his grip and slicing down his finger. Chris gently took him by the wrists and tried to pull him to his feet, though Isaac twisted away and fumbled the glass into the nearby trash bin, still murmuring apologies that he could barely hear himself. He didn't hear the rip of the paper towel, but he felt Chris press it against his bleeding finger, cupping his jaw with his other hand.

" _Isaac_ ," he said firmly, his voice shuddering through the haze.

He stared up at Chris, still recoiled in on himself with his muscles drawn and taut. Chris' thumb drew across his lower lip, easing it down enough to catch the hint of sharp fangs pressing through. He could only imagine his eyes flecked in yellow as well, though he didn't feel the beast roaring forward inside him, only the nervous pacing of a scared boy.

Chris steered him away from the rest of the broken glass and drops of blood on the floor, still holding the paper towel to his finger, and gathered Isaac against his chest. He cradled Isaac's head against his shoulder, fingers running through his hair as he did his best to calm and soothe.

"It's okay," he said, "it's just a little glass, nothing to get upset over."

It took him a while to stop trembling, but Chris didn't let go of him until his breathing had slowed to normal again and he relaxed against the man's chest. His fingers were still threaded through Isaac's curls, but he gently slipped his hand down to the back of his neck as he pulled away. He still felt weak and pale and tired, but Chris led him over to the breakfast table and tucked him down in a chair, leaving him there as he went back to sweep up the rest of the glass. Isaac watched him blankly for a moment, then turned his attention to the bloody paper towel. He peeled it away from his finger, the paper clinging wet to his skin and stared at his hand smeared with blood and no sign a wound had ever been there. His panic might have arrested his healing, but in the last few seconds it kicked in as strong as ever.

When Chris came back to him, the small mess cleaned up, he knelt on the floor between Isaac's feet and reached out to tip his head up. "Are you okay?"

He nodded shallowly, raising a hand to drag through his hair. "I'm sorry."

"It's okay," Chris shook his head. He took the paper towel from Isaac's fingers and gave his hand a quick once-over, then pressed a soft kiss to his finger just where the cut had been.

Isaac frowned and curled his hand against his chest. "You shouldn't do that," he said, and almost immediately regretted it, at least until Chris responded with a soft chuckle.

"You can't get it through blood," he said, "at least not that way. Trust me." He folded his hands softly around Isaac's and stood, urging him back to his feet. "Come on, let's get this cleaned up."

Isaac stumbled back to his feet, letting Chris lead him to the sink where he ran water over Isaac's hand and washed the blood off, his hands gentle, checking for pieces of glass that might have gotten stuck. He lingered close to Chris' side, cheek pressed against his shoulder again, almost trying to hide from the accident. He wasn't prone to extreme reactions, but he did have a tendency to shut down, and the fact that Chris was giving him a secure space to check out to his safe-place made him want to cling. Chris dried off his hand, tossed the used paper towels away, and wrapped his arms snug around Isaac's shoulders again.

"Is there anything I can do?" Chris asked after a moment, but all Isaac could do was shrug weakly and ball his hands in the back of Chris' shirt.

All he could think was that Chris felt warm and safe, strong, that he was doing everything that Isaac had always wanted someone to do for him. It was hard to stop himself from romanticizing the affection, but the surge of chemicals in his brain made that an impossible thing to control. He nuzzled in further against Chris' neck, grasping tighter for him, holding on as if he had nothing else in the world to anchor him. Chris responded in kind, soothing one hand through his hair and the other up and down his back.

Isaac was the first to move, though he was more nervous now, if for an entirely different reason than he'd been before. He wondered if he would be able to blame the wolf or some strange reaction to panic, but he tipped his head up and pressed his lips against Chris'. The man seemed startled at first, and he pulled back, looking at Isaac with a mix of confusion and concern. Isaac shrunk back and chewed on his lower lip, looking apologetic. He didn't mean to throw a guilt trip or anything like that, but Chris' expression softened the moment his own flinched, and he cradled the back of Isaac's head to pull him in again.

The kiss was as gentle as Chris' hands had been, with a touch of uncertainty from either side. Isaac still felt vaguely like he was going to burst into tears at any moment, but that just made him hold tighter - his hands now twisted in the front of Chris' shirt instead of the back. Isaac had a couple inches over Chris, which felt a little strange as he leaned in to kiss him, but neither one seemed bothered by it. Little by little, each one of them gained confidence - or perhaps just the conviction that lines had already been crossed so they may as well obliterate them completely - until Isaac found himself pressed against the island counter behind him.

Chris' hands moved from his hair to his hips, simply holding him rather than holding him _there_. He sighed against the man's mouth and carefully parted his lips, inviting him deeper, inviting him to take more than he might have been willing to at first. Whatever rationale Chris might have been trying to hold onto at first disappeared entirely at that moment, and he slipped his hands slowly under Isaac's teeshirt. Isaac loosened his fists from his shirt and drew them up Chris' chest, then wrapped them tight around his shoulders to hold him closer.

Hands dragged over his skin, each touch drawing a deeper moan out of Isaac, every movement just as soft and reassuring as before. He tried to reassure with his lips and teeth and tongue, kisses getting a more biting the longer Chris touched him. He whimpered against Chris' lips, canting his hips forward in an attempt to relieve some of the pressure that had started pooling down below. Chris responded by dragging one hand down to the back of Isaac's thigh, hitching his leg up and pinning him against the counter with his own thick thigh.

How they'd gone from comforting to nearly fucking was hard to say, and Isaac wasn't entirely sure he even cared, because _this_ felt just as good as _that_ had, albeit in a totally different way. He didn't care to think about it at all, or anything that wasn't Chris' hands on his flesh and Chris' mouth on his mouth. Maybe it was just the adrenaline surging through him, but the only thing he wanted was _more_.

His luck being what it was, however, he was going to have to wait a while longer for _more_...

"Oh my _god_..." Allison breathed, standing in the kitchen archway with Lydia lingering, smirking wildly, behind her. "He adopted a boyfriend!" She threw her hands up in the air, turned on her heel, and grabbed Lydia by the back of her jacket to drag her upstairs, still muttering about how she couldn't even come home to something normal. Lydia dragged her feet, rubber-necking the entire way upstairs.

Isaac felt his cheeks go red again, for an entirely different reason than the last time, and he cast a bashful look over at Chris.

"Let's be honest," Chris tipped his head towards Isaac, "it's not even the weirdest thing she's seen in this kitchen."

Isaac snorted and burrowed in against Chris' neck.


End file.
